means to develop the first and
satisfy the last to the fullest extent. He had received the most
careful education that was then possible for a young Roman noble. He
practised the fine arts under the best teachers; he studied law,
history, and philosophy in the famous schools of Berytus, Alexandria,
and Athens with brilliant success. But all this did not satisfy him. He
felt the breath of decay in all the art and science of his time. In
particular, his study of philosophy had only the effect of destroying
the last traces of belief in his soul, without affording him any
results. When he returned home from his studies, his father, according
to the custom of the time, introduced him to political life, and his
brilliant talents raised him quickly from office to office.

But all at once he abandoned his career. As soon as he had made himself
master of the affairs of state, he would no longer be a wheel in the
great machine of a kingdom from which freedom was excluded, and which,
besides, was subject to a barbarian King.

His father died, and Cethegus, being now his own master and possessor
of an immense fortune, rushed into the vortex of life, enjoyment, and
luxury with all the passion of his nature.

He soon exhausted Rome, and travelled to Byzantium, into Egypt, and
even as far as India.

There was no luxury, no innocent or criminal pleasure, in which he did
not revel; only a well-steeled frame could have borne the adventures,
privations, and dissipations of these journeys.

After twelve years of absence, he returned to Rome.

It was said that he would build magnificent edifices. People expected
that he would lead a luxurious life in his houses and villas. They were
sadly deceived.

Cethegus only built for himself the convenient little house at the foot
of the Capitol, which he decorated in the most tasteful manner; and
there he lived in populous Rome like a hermit.

He unexpectedly published a description of his travels, characterising
the people and countries which he had visited. The book had an
unheard-of success. Cassiodorus and Boëthius sought his friendship, and
the great King invited him to his court.

But on a sudden he disappeared from Rome.

What had happened remained a mystery, in spite of all malicious,
curious, or sympathetic inquiries.

People told each other that one morning a poor fisherman had found
Cethegus unconscious, almost dead, on the shores of the Tiber, outside
the gates of the city.

A few weeks later he again was heard of on the north-east frontier of
the kingdom, in the inhospitable regions of the Danube, where a bloody
war with the Gepidae, Avari, and Sclavonians was raging. There he
fought the savage barbarians with death-despising courage, and followed
them with a few chosen troops, paid from his private means, into their
rocky fortresses, sleeping every night upon the frozen ground. And
once, when the Gothic general entrusted to him a larger detachment of
troops in order to make an inroad, instead of doing this, he attacked
and took Sirmium, the enemy's fortified capital, displaying no less
good generalship than courage.

After the conclusion of peace, he travelled into Gaul, Spain, and again
to Byzantium; returned thence to Rome, and lived for years in an
embittered idleness and retirement, refusing all the military, civil,
or scientific offices and honours which Cassiodorus pressed, upon him.
He appeared to take no interest in anything but his studies.

A few years before the period at which our story commences, he had
brought with him from Gaul a handsome youth, to whom he showed Rome and
Italy, and whom he treated with fatherly love and care. It was said
that he would adopt him. As long as his young guest was with him he
ceased his lonely life, invited the aristocratic youth of Rome to
brilliant feasts in his villas, and, accepting all invitations in
return, proved himself the most amiable of guests.

But as soon as he had sent young Julius Montanus, with a stately suite
of pedagogues, freedmen, and slaves, to the learned schools of
Alexandria, he suddenly broke off all social ties, and retired into
impenetrable solitude, seemingly at war with God and the whole world.

Silverius and Rusticiana had, with the greatest difficulty, persuaded
him to sacrifice his repose, and join in the conspiracy of the
Catacombs. He told them that he only became a patriot from tedium. And,
in fact, until the death of the King, he had taken part in the
conspiracy--the conduct of which, however, was wholly in his and the
archdeacon's hands--almost with dislike.

It was now otherwise.

Until now, the inmost sentiment of his being--the desire to test
himself in all possible fields of intellectual effort; to overcome all
difficulties; to outdo all rivals; to govern, alone and without
resistance, every circle that he entered; and, when he had won the
crown of victory, carelessly to cast it aside and seek for new
tasks--all this had never permitted him to find full satisfaction in
any of his aims.

Art, science, luxury, office, fame. Each of these had charmed him. He
had excelled in all to an unusual degree, and yet all had left a void
in his soul.

To govern, to be the first, to conquer opposing circumstances with all
his means of superior power and wisdom, and then to rule crouching men
with a rod of iron; this, consciously and unconsciously, had always
been his aim. In this alone could he find contentment.

Therefore he now breathed proudly and freely. His icy heart glowed at
the thought that he ruled over the two great inimical powers of the
time, over both Goths and Romans, with a mere glance of his eye; and
from this exquisite feeling of mastery, the conviction arose with
demonic force, that there remained but one goal for him and his
ambition that was worth living for; but one goal, distant as the sun,
and out of the reach of every other man. He believed in his descent
from Julius Cæsar, and felt the blood rush through his veins at the
thought--Cæsar, Emperor of the West, ruler of the Roman Empire!

A few months ago, when this thought first flashed across his mind--not
even a thought, not a wish, only a shadow, a dream--he was startled,
and could not help smiling at his own boundless assurance.

_He_, Emperor and regenerator of the Empire! And Italy trembled under
the footsteps of three hundred thousand Goths! And the greatest of all
barbarian kings, whose fame filled the earth, sat on his powerful
throne in Ravenna!

Even if the power of the Goths were broken, the Franks and Byzantines
would stretch their greedy hands over the Alps and across the sea to
seize the Italian booty. Two great kingdoms against a single man! For,
truly, he stood alone amid his people. How well he knew, how utterly he
despised his countrymen, the unworthy descendants of great ancestors!
How he laughed at the enthusiasm of a Licinius or a Scævola, who
thought to renew the days of the Republic with these degenerate Romans!

He stood alone.

But the feeling only excited his ambition, and, at that moment, when
the conspirators had left him, when his superiority had been more
plainly proved than ever before, the thoughts which had been a
flattering amusement of his moody hours, suddenly ripened and formed
themselves into a clear resolve.

Folding his arms across his mighty chest, and measuring the apartment
with heavy steps, like a lion in his cage, he spoke to himself in
abrupt sentences:

"To drive out the Goths and prevent Franks and Greeks from entering,
would not be difficult, with a brave host at one's back; any other man
could do it. But alone, quite alone, more hindered than helped by these
knaves without marrow in their bones; to accomplish the impossible; to
make these cowards heroes; these slaves, Romans; these servants of the
priests and barbarians, masters of the world; that, _that_ is worth the
trouble. To create a new people, a new time, a new world, with the
power of his single will and the might of his intellect, is what no
mortal has yet accomplished--that would be greater than Cæsar!--_he_
led legions of heroes! and yet, it can be done, for it can be imagined.
And I, who can imagine it, can do it. Yes, Cethegus, that is an aim for
which it is easy to think, to live, to die! Up, and to work! and
henceforward, no thought, no feeling, except for this one thing!"

He stood still at last before a colossal statue of Cæsar, sculptured in
Parian marble, which--a masterpiece of Arkesilaus, and, according to
family tradition, given by Julius Cæsar himself to his son--stood
before the writing-divan, the most sacred treasure of the house.

"Hear me, divine Cæsar! great ancestor!" exclaimed Cethegus, "thy
descendant dares to rival thee! There is still something higher than
anything which thou hast reached; even to soar at a higher quarry than
thou, is immortal; and to fall--to fall from such a height--is the most
glorious death. Hail! Once again I know why I live!"

He passed the statue, and threw a glance at some military maps of the
Roman Empire, which lay unrolled upon the table.

"First trample upon these barbarians: Rome! Then once more subdue the
North: Paris! Then reduce the rebellious East to its old subjection to
the Cæsar-city: Byzantium! and farther, even farther, to the Tigris, to
the Indus; farther than Alexander; and back to the West, through
Scythia and Germania, to the Tiber; the path, Cæsar, which Brutus'
dagger cut off for thee. And so to be greater than thou, greater than
Alexander----hold, my thought! Enough!"

And the heart of the icy Cethegus flamed and glowed; the veins of his
temples throbbed violently; he pressed his burning forehead against the
cold marble breast of Julius Cæsar, who majestically looked down upon
him.